Jag skrev det följande för ett par veckor sedan för mina kollegor (som inte pratar svenska, så jag ber om ursäkt för engelskan).
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I have been using an iPad WiFi 32 GB for a couple of weeks, and here are my impressions.
I have been using an iPhone since the first generation iPhones came out. So the user interface for the iPad is very familiar to me, as they are built on the same software platform.
Hardware
The iPad, like its older but smaller siblings, the iPod Touch and the iPhone, is a very well designed device. It is a pleasure to hold and it fits well in the hand. The only surprise is that it feels slightly heavy. You do need to prop it up against something if you are holding it whilst using it for an extended time. It feels more like a hardback book to hold than a paperback.
The buttons stick out an amount which is just right. The main difference between the Apple iPhone and the iPad is that the iPad has a rotate lock button where the iPhone has a button to silence the ringer.
The screen is well lit and has sufficiently good resolution for what the device is trying to achieve. The pixels per inch is slightly lower than what the iPhone has, but this I haven’t found to be a problem.
You will struggle somewhat to sit in direct sunlight and read the screen, but otherwise I general find the backlit screen adequate for using outside. Inside or if it is somewhat darker i consider the screen one of the best I have ever had.
Batteries
A portable device really lives and dies with its batteries (pun intended). The iPad WiFI has a claimed life of 10 hours and independent tests have verified this with video running the whole time. I have seen nothing to indicate that it doesn’t last for 10 hours.
The way I use the iPad it really needs a long life battery. I primarily use it for reading, web sites and books and I tend to read several hours in a stretch. During my use so far I haven’t run out of batteries in a single day.
The only issue with the batteries is with the charging through a USB port. Most USB ports do not have high enough voltage to charge the iPad at the same time as you are using it. So don’t leave it attached whilst syncing new movies onto the iPad and think that it gets charged at the same time. It doesn’t. It only charges from low power USB ports when it is asleep, and then somewhat slowly. If you need to charge it faster then you need to plug it into a power socket.
Applications and operating system
The hardware is nice, but the iPad shines because of its applications and the operation system which it runs: iPhone OS.
The iPad is in general easy to set up. The only issue is that you have to have it connected to a computer with iTunes to be able to set it up and sync music, films, books etc. When attached to your computer iTunes (at least on a Mac) fires up and backs up your iPad and syncs it.
iTunes is maybe not the most elegant way of doing this, but at least you don’t have to store all your particulars with Google…
The only exception to easy setup was setting up the IMAP server for the email, but this is more a function of the IMAP protocol and the information needed to set this up than anything wrong with the iPad. It is the same with any email system you need to connect to a client system.
The on-screen keyboard is good enough for typing short things, like a URL or a quick reply to an email, but I don’t really think it can replace a real keyboard if you need to type any longer content (I am typing this on my MacBook Air).
Web browser
The application I use the most is the web browser. The web browser is Safari and it is a good. Not perfect, but good. The issues I have with it is that the mobile version of Safari doesn’t deal with iFrames. So if you have an iFrame with a scrollbar you don’t see the scrollbar and there is no indication that you are missing information on the page. It is the same for Safari on the iPhone.
The browser is relatively quick and otherwise works well. Complex web pages sometimes take a while to render and this is probably the main area where you will notice that the iPad isn’t running your normal multi gigahertz desktop or laptop processor.
There has been a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth over the fact that the iPad doesn’t support Adobe Flash, but personally I prefer it that way. What content do I watch using Flash? Video primarily and nearly all the video services are moving to H.262
Books
The second most used application for me on the iPad is iBooks. Because the iPad has not been released in Sweden yet I had to go through a quite convoluted process to get the iBook application onto the iPad. But that will of course change when we are not forced to privately import the iPad.
The Apple iBook store, which is only accessible directly from the iBook application, is intuitive and easy to use, but so far has a relatively limited selection. There are a number of free books you can download, but otherwise books cost from $10.
The most important part, for me, about the iBooks application is that it reads non copy protected (non-DRM) ePub books. Which means that you can download books which are out of copyright, from The Gutenberg Project, or buy books at some of the online stores which don’t have DRM on their electronic books, like O’Reilly’s bookstore (technical computer books) and Baen Books (science fiction books, and only $6/book!!).
The iBooks application is pleasant enough and I have so far read four full books of over 3000 pages (screens) in total and I have found the experience to be somewhat better than reading an actual book. Primarily this is because I often read at night and I find lighting to be an issue. But with the iPad backlit screen I this is not a problem at all.
It should be noted that I am fairly short-sighted and I prefer to read a book without my glasses, which means I hold it relatively close to my face, about 25 cm (often lying on my back in the sofa or bed, with the bottom of the iPad resting on my chest). But with the good screen and the ability to set the font size on the screen I think the iPad book reading experience is really good. Tools like bookmarks, an in-book dictionary and search (When did that persona show up the first time in the book again?) improves the reading experience. I use the dictionary much more than I expected.
What I am missing is the ability to look up any word from Wikipedia and have it display in a mini-window in the book application.
You can also get the Amazon Kindle application for the iPad. The Kindle app seems decent, but I haven’t really read much on it yet so I can’t really comment yet. There are several other book applications with attached bookstores too.
Email
Apple’s email application is good. I find the way they have structured the application works better in landscape mode than in portrait mode. But at least I have a choice.
Video
The iPad has two video applications, the YouTube application, for when you are online and the Video application which stores video locally. The Video application is meant to display videos from the Apple iTunes store, but you can also rip DVDs (with an application like Handbreak) and then load them into iTunes and sync them onto your iPad.
I have watch a couple of videos, Dr. Who, ripped by Handbreak, when I flew to Amsterdam last week. The only issue was that the volume was a bit low when being in an aircraft and really benefitted from having closed headphones, preferably with noise cancellation.
The viewing experience otherwise was superior to anything you will find on a plane (unless you pay for First Class tickets I presume) and the batteries will let you watch video for a ten hour flight without interruption.
Calendar
The Calendar application is decent, but has some strange shortcomings. You can’t click on a day/time to create a new event. You have to click a plus sign to create an event. Once an event has been created I haven’t found a way to change the actual calendar it belongs to. You can swipe up and down to see the calendar for a day, but you can’t swipe left and right to move a day/week/month back or forth, but you have to use a small dated scroll bar tool.
The Calendar’s real strength is when you have syncing turned on, which will sync your calendar on the iPad, your iPhone and your Mac. But this syncing service is a paid for service called Mobile Me and costs $99/year. I find it worth it and as a bonus you get the “Find my iPhone/iPad” service, which uses the GPS in your iPhone/iPad to locate your device when you have lost it or miss-placed it.
Photos
The Photo application is easy to use and intuitive. Many people really like it for showing their photos, but I haven’t used it that much yet.
Other applications
There are plenty of applications being added to the Apple App Store and I predict that some of the most exciting stuff that will come out of the iPad will come from third party developers.
Other applications I use at the moment are:
Early Edition, which assembles RSS feeds into something that resemble an traditional newspaper. (Paid)
Twitterific, a Twitter application, not quite as successful with a new user interface as the iPhone Twitterific app. (Free)
Instapaper, a way to easily store away web pages when you web browsing to read offline later. (Paid)
Civilization Revolution, a game based on the Civilization series, decent, but somewhat too automated for my taste, I like the old style micromanagement better. (Paid)
PressReader, a way to get hundreds of newspapers electronically downloaded to your device. (Free)
Several news applications, like Financial Times Mobile Edition, BCC News International, which are all trying to find a good format for news on the iPad. (Free)
Wired Magazine, which is mainly advertising in electronic format and some lightweight content. (Paid)
Adobe Ideas, a finger sketch application. (Free)
You can have all your applications from your iPhone, but in general that feels less than successful with pixel doubling to fill the screen.
Conclusion
How do I like it? For a first version of the product I think the iPad is great. I think of it is a media consumption device first and foremost, with some capability to create, like write a short note or send an email.
Is it worth $500-$800? Yes.
Does it replace a laptop? No. Maybe with a keyboard you could use it as a laptop, but without one I can’t see that you would want to do that for any length of time.
The Good
The hardware and battery life
The web browser
The book application
The App Store
The Bad
Rough edges in applications, like Calendar, but expect this to improve
More hardware to carry around
The Ugly
I am addicted to Apple hardware and software. Also the unified experience is starting to become really compelling with MobileMe, iTunes etc. which is starting to really lock me in. There is just no way I would switch this for a Ubuntu system or a Windows system.
